From the Bookshelf of Nonfiction Reading - Only the Best…

Like Charlie Chaplin, Aristophanes embodies rebellious, dissident laughter. In fact, I have always thought this pair’s humor has the feel of a family, one where Chaplin would be the genial cousin and Aristophanes the sarcastic grandpa.

Both were interested in ordinary, vulnerable people; their heroes are never among the elite. In the guise of the Tramp, Chaplin appears as a vagrant, as an escaped prisoner, as an immigrant, as an alcoholic, as a worker down on his luck, or as a famished miner in search of gold.

The protagonists of Aristophanes’s comedies are people—men and women—without the assets of nobility; they are tricksters, tax-dodgers crippled by debt, people weary of war, seeking sex and merriment, foul-mouthed and perhaps not starving, but always dreaming of stuffing their faces with lentils, meat, and pies.

The Tramp identifies with orphans and single mothers, falls in love with beggar women, and, when he sees the chance, delivers a kick in the rear to an unsuspecting policeman. He has the audacity to ridicule the filthy rich, business tycoons, immigration officials, haughty World War I soldiers, and even Hitler himself.

Aristophanes’s creations, of a similar stripe, attempt to end a war by means of a sex strike, occupy the Athenian Assembly to decree the institution of communal property, make fun of Socrates, or propose to cure the god of wealth’s shortsightedness so he can do a better job of distributing assets. After a series of unruly adventures and intrigues, all of these works end in a festive, teeming, Pantagruelian banquet.

Both Aristophanes and Chaplin ran into problems with the law.